There is no chain to count the heart wrenching marking of days that began sometime in the last few weeks and surprised me with its “still crazy after all these years” presence.  My daughter’s birthday is, oddly enough, also the anniversary  of her birth and thusly of what is one of the worst days of my life in spite of the amazing ten fingered, ten toed little beauty that came with it.  New Year’s Eve 2005 marked the beginning of years of a new sort of distress that my brain wasn’t used to regardless of the years of training in mental dysfunction I had.  Post-partum depression and a fresh batch of PTSD.   I hid it mostly, for the first year but by her first birthday I was shocked to wake up in a sweat.  Not long after that I was waking up very differently and without my little girl beside me.

I have worked so blessed hard to get better from this, let alone the mental and physical scars from days gone by.  But each year as December rolls in my chest tightens and breathing gets that much harder to manage.  The spirit of celebration is masked by fatigue, flashbacks and restlessness.  Fear and anticipation of The Day’s arrival choke me and leave me feeling split in two with a cleaver, as though anybody could see the wretched ache inside me.  Anybody could prey on it.

Yet this is my precious little one’s birthday and I should be struggling with pink streamers, glittery balloons and foolish party hats- not symptom control.  I know though that I need a second by second plan for that day from the moment I wake up to when I take an extra sleeping pill to fall asleep.  Without a round the clock plan there is too much room for emotional disaster.  4 years after my baby was taken from me so easily while I cried out until I was helped to calm down by a syringe and an anesthesiologist who turned blurry in seconds- and I am still stuck.  The distance is still there in little places throughout the year but on what should be her day and her day alone I am still having to distance myself from the moments, the day, from HER.

I would like to say that I will return this topic and release more.  Not just for myself but because somewhere inside me I know I must not be the only one.  And I DO believe that I am not the only with anniversaries of pain and mental paper chains to count down.  However, I am still not through the paper links.  There are still rings for children to argue over ripping before the arrival of that day of days.  The day when the whole world celebrates a fresh start, my daughter is showered with “my haven’t you growns” and I pray for a knock out pill that will keep me standing but get me through the day without feeling the sharp sting of tears or pulling of scars.  So I can’t really say that I’ll get back to this soon because I don’t want the pressure and I don’t want to rope myself into failure right now.  When the time is right I will share more and as always I welcome (very nearly plead with) you to share with me, on site or via email.

My daughter is nearly 4 years old.  Not a baby anymore and oh so bright and beautiful.  She is my love and my light and I hate and fear that one day she will read my words.  I never want her to blame herself for my swollen eyed, frantic Decembers and stumbling Happy Birthdays.  I never want her to feel the depth of my depths and feel like she dug the pits herself.

I hope that she will teach me to love December 31st for what it is- her birthday and New Year’s Eve.  I hope that one year I stop calling it the anniversary of her birth and my mental countdown will disappear.  I will only hope to be able to stay awake long enough to watch the ball drop with her and the rest of my family beside me.  She was born on a day of worldwide celebration.  There will always be a party on her birthday (god save me on her 21st!) even if I can’t throw it.  Her bounce, her giggle and her clarity of vision has fueled my breaths, my heartbeats and my kisses for 4 difficult years that I would never trade.

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Just now my DVR disrupted the recording of a show I wanted to watch.  A repeat, one that I may have even seen already but I wanted to record in case I hadn’t.  When I asked my husband to fix it there came an escalation, or maybe a de-escalation.  How should I describe me swearing horribly at my husband, twisting the remote as if I could break it with bare hands and breathing more quickly than a racehorse at the end of the Kentucky Derby?  It got worse.  There was twisting and turning, begging and pleading.  Things I won’t put to page because I am not yet that brave.  All of it a showing of vulnerability I despise.

Because of TV?  An electrical malfunction?  Why is TV so important- this is my second post that highlights its place in my life?  I’m beginning to understand why people worry so much about the television as babysitter.  I’m 32 and I pay it every month to keep me busy.  I must make a note to watch less TV and pick up macramé or perhaps a weekly bridge group.  I digress.  Boy, do I digress.

I know better than to believe that I should blame the silver box beneath the flat screen.  I already mentioned the medicine changes, although I stand behind them as being the right moves.  Last week I wrote about my overwhelming fatigue and of course that can play into a flash of panic and irrational anger.  Of course there is the ankle sprain and twisted knee that I sustained on Sunday during the extreme sport of apple picking.  There are also the other chronic pain conditions I have that cause me to be on a separate cocktail favored by pharmaceutical reps.

And so I write somewhat briefly and definitely without my best skill right now to say that sometimes even when things are okay I cannot, must not forget the undercurrents of the diseases that are rooted in my brain.  I cannot ignore the pangs that go through my stomach or the quick, double breaths I occasionally take.  So many things make me, us, anybody and everybody, vulnerable to falling into a bear trap.

I am tired.  It hurts right there.  How come I forgot to do that thing?  He/She is being ridiculous.  Stop tailgating.  Is the bank wrong or am I?  I just need two more inches of space.  I only wanted to watch the one damn show and then I will go to bed.  I am thirsty.

Little things, big things, the size in this case simply does not matter in the least.  Vulnerable is vulnerable and for someone with depression, anxiety, mania, PTSD, you name it- the smallest of bear traps can be the most deadly.  I am lucky that tonight I was not alone and I had enough wits to want to hold it together and want help even when I pushed it away and I think even called it names.  My bear trap of an anxiety attack and outburst of anger came equipped with a ladder: my husband and his steady hands and clear mind.  They should all be that easy.

I am saddened to read backwards and see that I have developed a view of panic, terror, helplessness, fits and rage as being able to be called “easy” even once.  However, I recognize that if I didn’t do this, I wouldn’t be able to get up most mornings and take my two kids to my son’s school where I make pleasant conversation with people who have no idea that this is my life.  I do not know their lives either.  I can only hope that this is a moment in time that will be lost as the minutes tick away.  I also hope that if even one of the people I make eye contact with in a day finds themselves surprised by a bear trap that they can reach a ladder or at least summon the courage to scream until they are heard.

I’m listening for them and will resolve to hone my ladder building skills.  It seems like a better past time than TV and is far less likely to be effected by electrical failures.

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The walls of green trees were clearly unstable and likely to collapse at any point- same as my lungs.  Turns in the road seemed less intentional and more like haphazard attempts to avoid impending doom.  Were we driving too fast?  Was my seat belt working?  Why were my little sisters being so loud and I was the only one who noticed?  How come my mother couldn’t hear me screaming from the passenger seat that I was dying, we were all dying, the mountains were all wrong and everything needed to stop?

She did hear me eventually- once I actually started making noises outside my head.  I cried, hyperventilated, yelled- the whole show.  And we did pull over and stop everything because clearly there was something wrong.  I scared my sisters but hey we look- we’re at a scenic trail stop.  We looked at a brook from a sweet little bridge in the woods and still I had no explanations for my mother’s questions.

I remember walking around a gravel covered area by myself and trying  to focus really hard on the teeny, crushed rocks.  All they did was remind me of the massive effects of calamity.  A boulder crushed into quarter size chunks.  What size would I be when the mountains fell?

Eventually there was no more stalling- nothing else to see, no more trails marked by wooden signs with animal footprints burned into them.  It was time to continue our happy vacation.  It was time to get back in the car and squeeze between the carved out mountains all the way to our lakeside vacation destination.  Happy.  Fun.

I remember other things about that trip and my mother should be pleased to know that some of those things make me smile or laugh or just feel warm.  But mostly I remember that trip as the time I sped through a mile high alley walled with pine needles to poke at me as I held my breathe and salt water spilled from my eyes.  I remember my lungs collapsing and the confusing inability to scream effectively.  It is my first memory of a panic attack and at the time I didn’t even have that name for it.  I must have been 12 or 13 but nobody did anything, nothing was changed except for the new sound of tiptoes around me until a rheumatologist passed me along to a therapist when I was 15.

Here is an odd thing: That place where my mother had to pull over, probably terrified herself, because I was frightening to watch and listen to- the bridge, the stream, the trails and wooden signs are so fresh and real to me even now.  As long as I pretend I can’t see the gravel- I love that spot.  I want to look over the rails at the water tumbling aimlessly over the river rocks, pulling leaves and twigs at will.  I want to follow a trail into the woods just far enough for it to get a little bit too dark and then I want to come back.  That spot- and I have no idea where exactly it is or even how to find it- was the first place I remember finding relief and refuge from that particular type of terror that I now know better than the alphabet.

In spite of its awfulness I sometimes like to think about that day.  Because it was so new and a stranger to all of us the only remedy was stopping the car and absorbing nature for awhile.  20 years later and the remedy is waiting at the pharmacy, is more attack than remedy or takes so much concentration and remembering of action plans and mantras that I can barely remember I am trying.  Have labels and sessions and stays and medicines made things better?

If that was the first time I thought I was facing imminent death- my first panic attack and we will assume it is because I don’t recall any others and I am a memory keeper, how many have I white-knuckled my way through in those 20 years since?  What would I do if I had all those minutes back?  I’m not sure I would even want them back.  Would they still be filled with panic or somehow fresh and clean, ready for newness and light?

When is time lost better off gone and when is it appropriate to mourn its absence?  I am very glad that I am too tired for math today or I would have some heavy accounting ahead.  And well, that just seems foolish to spend minutes counting up the minutes you have already lost, even if I do find it tempting to have my own badge of courage style panic tally.  Which would then lead to receiving the “Anxiety and Panic Gold Master Level” iron-on badge.

The mentally ill club isn’t the Girl Scouts but it would be so much nicer if we got to wear sashes.

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My loved ones want me to get better. They are sure that there is action I can take to get better. I know that they are right. It scares me that they can see it- I am a world class actress after all.  It must be really bad.

I’ve curled up into myself because I know how to take care of me, to keep from falling over that precipice that looms on all sides of my psyche, craving a misstep. It’s hard to explain how withdrawing helps- it just does.

I think that sometimes depression causes so much pain the sufferer’s only recourse is to anesthetise themselves. I used to do that by using drugs and alcohol. Now I do it by drawing myself up into a ball, so that my insides aren’t exposed.

I am starting therapy again and I know that it will help. There’s no magic pill for this, it is something I have to tread through. That may be the hardest part about living with depression and anxiety. When every fiber in your being is screaming at you to keep quiet, keep still, keep yourself safe- to take those steps towards recovery- I am jumping off of a god damned cliff.

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I’ve figured out that when the belly is disrupted in any way, I break out into a serious panic attack. I am certain that it’s been this way for years but I am only now becoming aware of it.

This particular panic attack from the belly region tells me to run very quickly. It begs for a sinkhole to open up on the very ground in which I stand, and to take me away this time. It begs to take me anywhere but here where the pain threatens to swallow me whole.

The lost girl stores her pain in my belly.

If I put on an article of clothing that is too tight, the belly signals the brain to run away as fast as possible because it hurts in there and we must not be reminded of that hurt.

After eating too much of a good meal, the pain signals the brain to crawl into a cave and hide where no one can see us. She is scared; she doesn’t want you to see her. If you see her, it will make it all real and she cannot possibly process everything if it is in fact, real.

My massage therapist, that I used to see on a regular basis told me that I always hold my left side closely, not letting go.

Louise L. Hay writes that problems with the left side of the body “represent receptivity, taking in, feminine energy, women, and the mother.” The stomach “holds nourishment and digests ideas.”

Not only do we store everything in our brains, but also in our bodies. Physical abuse is stored in your body, your body remembers it. This is why I get a certain type of headache around certain people, and why my shoulders lock up in my neck with certain stressful situations.

It is exactly why I used to bite my nails until they bled when I was at her house.

A frightened child who is not letting go of the pain even though it weighs her down is living in my belly. She didn’t have anywhere else to go, and doesn’t know what to do with the pain because it’s all she has.

I am grateful to have finally found her hiding place.

Now, I can invite her to come out so that I can nourish her with the kind and loving energy of a mother who soothes her frightened child.

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After two months of being on it and noticing no change in the near-crippling depression I was experiencing, my doctor decided to increase the dose. I didn’t notice the change at first, but looking back, I can see that shortly after the increase, I became more and more anxious. I started isolating myself from my friends, believing that they didn’t want to be around me and that some of them were actively turning people against me. I stopped picking up the phone, going out, writing emails. I felt utterly alone and scared.

And then, the panic attacks started. I thought I had experienced these before, but I’ve never felt anything this extreme. Racing thoughts, a barrage of negativity, shaking hands, heart pounding out of my chest, difficulty breathing, inability to sleep, and the intense fear that I was going to lose control and do something I didn’t want to do.

Once they started, almost anything triggered the anxiety. I went to work last week and had to go home after a few hours because everything set me off. A simple assignment, a notice of a meeting taking place in a few weeks, even getting a new email filled me with panic. I was paralyzed by fear, unable to work or even be in that place.

It’s now a week later and I still can’t shake that feeling.

I can’t get into my doctor until Tuesday, but I know she’ll take me off the Wellbutrin, so I’ve stepped myself down to the regular dose. Since I did that, the attacks have stopped and the anxiety has abated (though I’m sure taking work out of the equation also helped), but the depression is back. I’m not sure what she will put me on next, but I’m beginning to dread it, because as we have seen, my track record with negative drug reactions is less than stellar.

I feel like we’re playing chemistry set with my brain, but I don’t know what else to do because I can’t get an appointment with a psychiatrist for three to six months. So, we put on our white frocks and pull out the test tubes and see what happens when we mix up the next batch of chemicals.

Cross your fingers for me.

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After a visit to the psychiatrist in which I described my symptoms (regular physical symptoms of  panic/anxiety with no underlying emotional connection or distress) and he responded by refilling my Xanax prescription, and dismissed the idea of checking my hormone levels, I went back to the OB/GYN/Reproductive Endocrinologist who performed my hysterectomy last year.  I described the same symptoms to him, and he nodded throughout, and said that, while he wasn’t prepared to say that I do not need psychiatric care, all of my symptoms fit the profile of someone suffering surgical menopause without enough estrogen replacement.  And my bloodwork confirmed that my estrogen level was low-ish, so we increased the dosage of my estrogen patch.

Ten days later, I feel on my way to being a new woman.  It is supposed to take three weeks for the effects of the dosage increase to be fully realized, but already, the 5 hours a day I was spending in a cold sweat, feeling panicky and unable to leave the house is down to a matter of minutes.   And what is bugging me right now is the idea that I have, perhaps, had hormone-imbalance problems for most of my adult life, and no one to recognize them as such, and treat them accordingly.

Knowing that many mental illnesses are triggered and/or exacerbated by hormonal events such as puberty, childbirth, and menopause, why is this not factored into diagnoses more often?   It’s not just women–men are affected as well.  My own husband seems to have experienced the first symptoms of bipolar disorder just after hitting puberty.  But with women, I have the feeling that it just gets…overlooked more often.  I mean, the very word “hysterectomy” pretty much indicates the medical community’s attitude toward things female, doesn’t it?  That woman is unbalanced, moody, highly emotional, downright erratic…hysterical.  By removing her reproductive organs, the part of her that’s female, we can make her sane.  Whatever.  I’m not crafting a very good explanation of what I’m getting at here, but I think you understand.   Hello, AMA?  It’s almost 2008.  Can we have a NEW WORD to replace “hysterectomy,” please?  Ugh.  And by going on a rant about this, HEY, I’ve just proven them right, haven’t I?

At least they can’t say I’m “PMSing” any more.

How about the rest of you, ladies?  What is your experience with the relationship between hormonal fluctuations and your mental/emotional state, particularly as regards diagnosed, medicated mental illness?  Are hormone levels checked regularly as part of your treatment regimen?  Is your “femaleness” even considered…or worse, is your mental state “written off,” even in part, due to gender and the perceived instability/emotional weakness of women?

Do you ever get the feeling that a doctor is listening to your symptoms, and wondering if it’s just “that time of the month?”

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The only sure thing is that my moods and anxiety/panic attacks always corresponded with something going on externally. You know, like lying awake at 4:00 AM wondering where my husband was, or lying awake sobbing for my lost child, or lying awake crying into my pillow because I NEED MY DADDY BACK. In other words, if things were going okay, I was fine. But somewhere along the line, especially since Dad died, something had gone KABLOOEY with the coping mechanisms that had served me for the first 35 years of my life. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around this, that some external event(s) could occur that could trigger a weakness, a malfunction, in my brain.

One day this spring, while I was discussing this with a wonderful friend–a friend who just happens to have been, for the last few years, a MUCH better friend to me than I’ve been to her, or to anyone else–who happens to be a doctor of pharmacy, not to mention having much personal experience with clinical depression and the meds that go along with it. I listed to her all the anti-depressants I’d tried, told her how none of them had worked, and asked her, “What (meaning what drug) can I try next?” She looked at me, and after just a moment’s consideration, said, “You know, Belinda, even though you’re depressed, you may not have an actual chemical imbalance. I mean, you’ve been through some pretty horrible, awful stuff, just year after year recently, and you have every right to feel despondent without it meaning that your brain is all wonky…like mine.” And then she laughed. And I saw a light. And I loved her like she was part of me, because she got it. And then she told me the hard part.

She said, “Sometimes, you can’t even live life ‘one day at a time.’ Sometimes, you have to live it in 30-minute increments. You can do almost anything for half an hour, no matter how badly you don’t want to. So on days when I just want to stay in bed with the blinds drawn, I make a deal with myself to go out to the barn and groom one horse. By the time that’s done, I might look over at YOUR horse” (she’s been keeping Misha for me for way longer than I meant for her to) “and decide that his mane needs detangling, so I brush Misha’s mane. Then I might want to clip his bridle path, and before you know it, I’ve spent half the day out in the sunshine, DOING something, instead of wallowing.”

Just when I had decided that Kerri was the most brilliant, insightful woman on the face of the planet, she confessed to having developed this coping mechanism after hearing a version of it in the film, “About A Boy.” She said, “Yep. 10 years of therapy and I finally learn something useful from a Hugh Grant monologue in a movie. Not the book–the MOVIE.”

She IS brilliant, my friend, and she’s definitely onto something. I can’t help but think that, since no AD has helped me feel better–not really–that whatever is wrong with my brain, it’s not something that an AD can “fix.” I’ve been off the most recent AD, Wellbutrin, since early March, with no noticeable effect at all. I don’t feel better, I don’t feel worse. Just the same. The anxiety symptoms have abated (I’m not having falling-down panic-attacks in Wal-Mart any more), but are still present to some degree, in proportion to what’s going on in my life. Every once in a while, I suddenly get HOT all over, start sweating from head to toe, my nose runs like a faucet, my heart pounds, and I just need to be HOME.

Something is particularly difficult about mornings, about just getting out the door. Once I’m out, I’m pretty good for a few hours, but my calm seems to have a shelf-life, and I need to get back home in the afternoon. I like to plan things pretty far in advance, but I have trouble committing to things in advance. Anti-anxiety meds help. I’m not wild about how they make me feel, i.e. slightly dopey, but I do use them when I need them.

And then there’s the hormone angle, which I don’t even know for sure how to approach. Something has GOT to be going on there, since the weirdness has escalated by, um, a bunch, since my hysterectomy last fall. When I first came out of surgery, on estrogen deprivation, I literally felt, for the first and only time in my life, that I had lost my mind. It’s like nothing I can describe–the misery, despair, agony, anxiety–the certainty that it’s never going to be better, ever. After a couple of weeks, I was able to start estrogen replacement therapy, and it was like a miracle…at least to a point. It made the extreme crazy go away, but like I said at the beginning of this post, I still ain’t quite right. But then, I’ve never had the dosage checked or adjusted, so there’s a thought…

And I can’t help but think that a large part of what keeps me “down” and anxious is the disarray of my lifestyle–I keep Bella clean, fed, loved, dressed well, entertained, cared for…and that’s almost (but not quite) the limit of my motivation…and THAT is my motivation for this effort. I don’t know yet if it will work, but I know that to have peace and calm, I must first have order. I need it, Bella needs it, Alex needs it. And I need to provide it. I’m on my way, I hope…the house is still a mess, but I’ve done certain chores more regularly this week, and my family has had a hot, homemade, nutritious meal on the table every night this week, with NO takeout. That’s got to be a start. And Alex, bless his ever-loving-heart, cleaned the living room today, which lifted my mood unbelievably.

I’d love to hear from anyone who’s been through, or is going through anything similar, especially from the hysterectomy angle. Or not. Just whatever. Can you just have bad things happen to you and suffer a shift in actual brain function? (Yes, these are questions for my shrink, but my next appointment’s a couple weeks off. Humor me.)

Adapted and significantly augmented from a nearly simultaneous post at www.ninjapoodles.com

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Autumn is a mixed-bag of emotion and memory and experience for me.

On the one hand, it (in theory, at least) marks the start of cooler weather and less yard work and the opportunity to eat thick hearty stews and homemade oatmeal bread without breaking a sweat.

I can wear my sweet, precious hoodies again and dig out some of my soft fluffy socks to wear inside my combat boots. There’s an anticipated trip to the Rockton Fair and that unmistakable smell of decaying leaves and, quite often, beautiful sunsets. Good things.

There are many good things about autumn and winter. I can see them and name them and touch them.

But the flip side, of course, is the Seasonal Affective Disorder creeping into my mood and my energy levels. And the depression that lurks.

The anniversaries and memories of death and dying and funerals and sadness – my parents, grandparents, best friend.. From September to February, my world is full of anniversaries of loss.

And let’s not forget the November anniversary of my month-long panic attack and the diagnosis of my panic disorder.

The skies grow darker, earlier, and I find myself wishing that I could curl up in a duvet until spring arrives. My beloved reminds me not to dwell on the memories. To acknowledge them and let them go. I’ve been getting better at it but it’s not good enough yet. Letting go. Letting go of the past.

At this point in autumn – the late days of September – I can already feel the tendrils of an impending collapse of my happiness. I try very hard to put it out of my mind. I remind myself that dwelling – on any of the aforementioned subjects – will not help me get through this. It will not make things better.

Dwelling is one of those things I do very, very well. I could win a gold medal in dwelling.

I dwell on conversations and images that are stuck in my head. I dwell on moments – pivotal moments – when my life shifted. I stack these memories up, together, and try to make sense of how I got to be this way. How did I become so afraid of the changing seasons?

The truth, of course, is that it wasn’t just one event or one circumstance that pushed me over the edge. And, perhaps, the cumulative effect of those experiences isn’t to blame either. There are too many possibilities – from the food I eat to the sleep I get – to try to make a neat, tidy package of explanation.

I realize I need to fight this. I realize that, if I don’t fight it, things will crash around me. But fighting is hard – I am an instant gratification junky. If it doesn’t impact on me immediately – a rush of adrenaline or a sugar-induced laughing fit – I can’t seem to make myself follow the rituals and routines. And yet, I know the only way to make it through the coming months is to fight.

If I don’t fight my hardest, my husband will come home from work and find me weeping about my life, my world, my existence. Weeping and blowing my nose and uttering absolutely useless phrases like, “I miss.. I miss.. EVERYBODY.” or “Everybody hates me and I have no friends and I am so alone.” Trying to expel a build-up of emotion that encompasses sadness and mourning and grief and fear is impossible. And, oh, god, there is so much fear.

This morning, my beloved dragged my SAD light out of the closet, dusted it off, and moved it upstairs to the bedroom. The idea is that I will bask in that light every morning from now until, well, next spring. I do not particularly enjoy the basking – try as I might – but I will do my best to sit patiently in the incredibly bright light for 30 minutes each day. Some days, I know, I will cheat and sneak downstairs earlier than I should.

I am back to my vitamins, my precious B12 and D and assorted omegas. I swallow them with my lunch – taking them at breakfast makes me nauseated for hours and hurts my stomach – and, if I believed in God, this is when I would pray. Please let the vitamins soar through my veins and adjust my chemistry and trick my cells into believing it is still summer and I am happy. Please let the B12 boost my sagging energy levels. Please, please, please. Please make it all okay.

I’m trying to motivate myself to get more intentional exercise – reportedly one of the best antidepressants available. I hate being sweaty and tired and out of breath but, as winter sneaks around me, I find myself tired and out of breath anyway. It’s as if my muscles are disintegrating in order to keep me motionless under a duvet all day.

I plod my feet along the treadmill in the darkened basement, trying to focus on recorded episodes of CSI – happily edited of commercials. I take advantage of the cooler days, when they come, and I walk the dogs to the park. I don’t feel any different.

Evidence that diet can impact majorly on depression makes me begin to read the various literature on the subject. Fresh vegetables. Omega-filled fish. Low fat, complex carbs. I know all of this and still I fight my body’s increased cravings for sugar and simple carbs.

I fight the instant gratification of junk food. Sometimes that makes me cry, too, as my body screams for cookies that will immediately soothe the anxiety and my brain shouts that I’m making it all worse if I indulge. It’s like those cartoons with a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other – except, in this case, they’re both angry and hostile and glaring and I can’t win.

Everything makes me melancholy. Everything makes me question myself. Everything – everything – makes me feel guilty. For being alive, I suppose. I am incredibly uncomfortable about everything – the screaming cravings, the urge to hibernate, the grief, my own body.

I struggle and I fight and I do the very best that I can but, so many times, I fear that I can’t do enough.

Am I fighting biology and chemistry or am I fighting memories that are embedded into the very core of who I am? Where does my past and those experiences end and where does the seratonin begin? How can I keep myself afloat when I am so very, very tired?

I take my daily antidepressant – the prescribed kind, I mean – and I resist increasing the dose. It sounds dramatic to say that it takes away my personality in higher doses but I’m pretty sure it does. Even my husband, who loves me and wants me to be happy, will agree that I am not myself when I am on higher doses.

And some days I am okay – more than okay – and I fool myself into thinking that every day will be like this. I will smile and laugh and enthusiastically work on a project at the dining room table. I start to think that I’ve finally won out over the sadness – I’ve won the war. I feel alive and healthy and happy. Grateful. I feel like myself.

Then I wake – the very next day – and my body feels like lead. I run the previous day through my mind and wonder what I did wrong. Was it the sandwich for lunch or did I not get enough sunshine? Or maybe it was the day before that? How did I drain all the happiness out of my world while I was sleeping?

Autumn arrives and the fight begins and I am already tired of dragging myself up the endless mountain ahead of me. And I am afraid, no matter what I say. I am afraid of the months ahead of me but I will fight.

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